Let me preface this by saying that of all the people ready to graduate in my high school, I was perhaps the most excited. Every single day was just another day to mark off the calendar, one day closer to graduation and this was not just in high school. In fact, when I was in sixth grade, my doctor asked me what I was most excited for as far as beginning middle school went, and I answered, "Only six more years until college."
The funny thing is, if you asked my friends now, they would probably tell you a completely opposite story. That is, that I am no longer as excited about college as I was six years ago.
This is not to say that high school years are the best years of your life, but it is to say that college years aren't either. In fact, I don't think any "years" are the "best" years of your life. Life, by definition, is just a random combination of bad and good, no matter whether you're in high school or college or married with kids or grandkids. What matters is what you make of it all, regardless of the cards you are dealt.
So, for all those reasons, I present to you all the reasons why you should just take a minute, slow down and appreciate high school while it lasts, because just take it from me, college is not worth rushing towards.
1. It's FREE
This is perhaps the biggest aspect that I completely neglected to appreciate while still in high school. I went from paying exactly nothing for my education, my books, my room and board and my meals to paying somewhere along the lines of a thousand dollars out of pocket every single semester. But that does not take into account extra costs associated with buying expensive books, paying club fees (which also seem to double and triple in cost, by the way), nor all the money I am fortunate enough to not have to pay thanks to my the scholarships I was granted (about $17,000 every single semester).
2. Home cooked meals
Maybe you'll make the decision to stay close to home and still have the absolute luxury of home cooked meals, but trust me, even if you do, it still will not be the same as living with your parents. Most of the time, you will be eating out of a cafeteria. And every single college student can back me up when I say that no matter how good your college's cafeterias are, it's still cafeteria food at the end of the day. Nothing can beat meals cooked in a home, especially when they're cooked by your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, ect.
3. College is extremely difficult
Take it from an AP, notoriously well-rounded, primarily A making student college is so far beyond what high school ever even tried to be. No matter how good you were in high school, I can almost guarantee you will struggle in college. I do not know a single college kid who says, "college is SO easy!" Most of us are stressed just about all the time, and a lot of us are studying almost constantly. If you want proof of this, a popular Twitter post that has been circulating says something along the lines of "College is cool bc if u relax for 5 seconds then all of a sudden ur failing 11 classes even tho ur only taking 5" and let me tell you, I have never read anything more truthful than that.
4. You no longer have a schedule
Even people who aren't completely dependent on schedules (like I am) still typically enjoy some level of regularity about their day to day life. I can almost guarantee that you won't have much of that in college. In fact, just about the time that you start getting comfortable with your class schedule, you'll be switching to new ones because the semester is already over. And although you switch classes every year in high school, you still followed a general schedule of seven in the morning to three in the afternoon and then you're free for the rest of the day. You always know when lunch is and you always know when your breaks are. Not the case with college. You might get stuck with eight a.m classes, or you might get stuck with eight p.m classes. You're probably going to have weird, useless periods of thirty minutes between classes or you're going to have no time at all and be stuck eating lunch in class, your plastic silverware making way more noise than you're comfortable with while students around you shoot varying looks at you.
5. Maintaining friends is much harder
Sure, people are way less judgmental in college (mostly relating to number 3, we're all just too stressed out to bother with judging others), but you no longer see people every day of the week from seven to three nor do you get to eat lunch with the same people every single day, nor are you all going through pretty much the same thing, which makes conversation topics relatively easy to come by. Making friends might be easier, but maintaining friends is a lot harder than ever before, because even when you do have free time, you're most likely going to need to be studying.
6. People still act the same (but now there's a whole lot more alcohol involved)
As I said before, people are less judgmental, but trust me, there is still just as much drama, if not more. Because, fact is, most college kids (college freshman anyway) still act just the same as high school students. They will still talk behind your back, take things personally, decide to oust you from their group and so forth. The difference now is that they all think they're big grownups, more so even than high school seniors (scary, right?). And because that mix isn't already bad enough, imagine it with extra alcohol and other bad decisions, because everyone thinks they're big adults that can do whatever they want.
7. Speaking with teachers is much harder
Your high school teachers are almost always available to talk. They're there before class, after class, during class, during lunch and just about any other time that you can think of. It's super easy to walk up to a teachers desk during class downtime and ask questions. Not the case in college. Professors have office hours during which you can speak with them one-on-one, otherwise, they're mostly lecturing the entire time during class, making it difficult to really have a one-on-one moment with them. And office hours sound great, but they require you to schedule your own day around their time and then hope that when you get there they aren't already helping someone else. Professors also aren't typically very great at responding to their emails and I've also had the case where I went by for office hours and the professor wasn't there, so good luck!
8. EVERYTHING is going to change
I don't care if you go five hours away from home or five minutes down the road. Or whether you go to college with friends or without knowing a single soul on the whole campus. No matter what, college changes everything. Most likely, college will suddenly saddle you with more responsibility than you have ever been dealt before. You will be dealing with more money issues than ever before. And basically everything becomes a continual teeter-totter of priorities, deadlines and dates-to-remember. For what is probably the first time in your life, you going to be looked at as an adult, not only by those around you, but by yourself (even if you remain in denial about it for some time). And no matter what, all of this change is going to be incredibly hard.
So, sure, complain about high school. It really, really sucks, believe me, I know. But getting to college is not going to solve anything (once again: believe me, I know). So stop trying to rush through your life, waiting for some magical fix. There are going to be really hard days and really great days whether you are in high school or not.
Take a deep breath, step back, and enjoy the moment for what it is worth.
